The White Helmets are 3,000 volunteers, formed in 2013 to search for people trapped under the rubble after bombs and airstrikes across Syria .

They are people from all walks of life – they include tailors, carpenters, builders, students and doctors – and are believed to have saved more than 62,000 lives.

But they have paid a heavy price, with 145 killed doing their job.

One of the White Helmets, 29-year-old smail Alabdullahm, spoke to the Daily Mirror and told us of the horrors he and the other volunteers face as they strive to save those trapped in the rubble following bombings in the beseiged rebel-held district of Aleppo .

(Image: Syria Civil Defence)

Ismail, who was a primary school teacher before the war, said: "It is the same at every bombing – we are scared. Every time we hear bombing we are scared, you can feel the heartbeat of everyone.

“When we go to the site… in our mind, we are going to see kids without heads, without hands. We ask God we won’t see this scene.”